


When You Come Home, Son, I'll Be Waiting

by myglassesaredirty



Series: The End of the Innocence [7]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: AU, Angst, Character Reactions, Episode: s05e01 Bug Out, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Major character death - Freeform, Vignette, i'm so sorry to those who subscribe to read irondad i just got really obsessed with this show, okay this is only partially my fault don't get mad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-06-22 21:14:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15590853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myglassesaredirty/pseuds/myglassesaredirty
Summary: Hawkeye Pierce gets to go home.It's just not how he imagined it.





	When You Come Home, Son, I'll Be Waiting

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, in all fairness, this is only partially my fault. I had this idea when I rewatched Bug Out and I told howlingdawn about it, but then I completely forgot about this. Then I rewatched season 4 and then later season 5 (for character analysis), but since I'd watched Bug Out only a couple of weeks earlier, I asked Dawn if I should still watch Bug Out and she said yes, so…this is not _technically_ my fault.

Now that he thinks about it, stopping to take a last look around the compound probably wasn’t the greatest idea he’s ever had. Especially considering the fact that there is no place to hide.

 

Margaret and Radar each clutch a part of his shirt in their hands, following him as close as they can without running him over. Hawkeye hears Radar take a sharp breath, and instinctively, he moves his left arm to push Radar behind him as best he can.

 

If one kid is getting out of this war alive, it’s going to be Radar.

 

Up ahead of them, someone scuffs the dirt. The three of them come to a halt, and Hawkeye feels his body go rigid, notices how his heart seems to slow down and speed up at the same time. His sharp eyes survey the camp, and he tilts his head, begging his ears to give him some sort of clue as to the location of the trespasser.

 

The first sound to reach his strained ears is the murmur of Chinese.

 

Hawkeye’s tongue becomes thick and heavy. He turns his head to address Margaret and Radar. “Get to the OR as fast as you can. I’m right behind you, I promise,” he whispers.

 

They both look to each other, and neither Margaret nor Radar makes any sort of movement in the direction of the OR. “I’m not leaving you, Hawkeye,” Margaret whispers back.

 

Radar lifts one shoulder in a shrug and shuffles closer to Hawkeye as quietly as he can. “Me neither. I feel safer with you.”

 

Hawkeye licks his lips and runs his tongue over his bottom teeth. He doesn’t mention how heartbreaking it is, to him, that Radar trusts him unfailingly, even when it might mean death.

 

“We’re in Communist territory, there’s an enemy soldier nearby, and I’m ordering you, Radar, to get to the OR. And Margaret, I’m begging you to get there, too.”

 

She squeezes his arm. “You promise you’re coming, too?”

 

“Have I ever left you, Margaret?”

 

Margaret opens her mouth, but she seems to realize the gravity of the situation. “Radar, do as he says.”

 

And Hawkeye doesn’t give the kid enough credit, he’s never disobeyed a direct order before, but this time, Radar squares his shoulders. “Only if you go, too, ma’am.”

 

Hawkeye jerks his head in the direction of the OR, and he can see the outline of a man coming towards them. “Go, _go.”_ He turns on his heel and herds Margaret and Radar towards OR, glancing over his shoulder as he runs after them.

 

The man sees them and takes off running after them. “Tíng! Wǒ huì kāi qiāng!”

 

He’s known terror before – after all, this is a war zone – but none of his experiences can compare to the heart-stopping fear he feels now. Maybe it’s because this time, there’s no I Corps to call, maybe this time they’re absolutely defenseless (without so much as Frank’s gun), and he’s not sure if the enemy will kill them or if he’ll take Margaret as prisoner and honestly, both options sound terrible to Hawkeye.

 

The Chinese soldier runs after them, and he’s fast. He’s missing an ear, the skin on his left arm dangles, and he has a shoulder wound, but he’s still running after them, and he’s gaining.

 

Hawkeye bites his lip and pushes Margaret and Radar ahead of him. “Get Radar into OR!” he shouts in Margaret’s ear. Her eyes are wide with fear, but she grabs Radar’s arm and pulls him along with her. Radar struggles a little bit, so Hawkeye shouts, “I’m right behind you!”

 

It’s a dirty, rotten lie, but Radar follows Major Houlihan to the OR anyways. Not that he had a choice in the matter, however. Margaret has one hell of a death grip when she needs it.

 

Hawkeye stops for just a moment. He wants to run into the relative safety OR will offer, but he doesn’t want to risk Margaret’s and Radar’s lives.

 

_“You promised!”_

 

The first time Radar had said those words to Hawkeye, a patient had died. Hawkeye had promised Radar that the soldier would live, but there was a complication that he hadn’t been able to catch in time. The words come back to haunt Hawkeye even now, and the Chinese soldier shouts again, and Hawkeye races towards the building.

 

Margaret and Radar disappear through the doors, and Hawkeye’s on their heels. “Thank God Dad let me run track,” he murmurs to himself. He can see them, and they stop to turn around when they hear his voice. He waves them forward, but both of them shake their heads.

 

The Chinese soldier opens fire.

 

Hawkeye spins on his heel, and he has just a moment to think before he feels the bullet tear through his bowel. He stops moving for a second, and he sways on his feet. He feels hotter, all of a sudden. He sees the next one.

 

He heard the bullets.

 

*

 

She’ll never forget the way his body jerks when he’s shot the second time.

 

She’ll never forget how he is dazed in his last moments, how his hand comes away from his stomach, shaking and stained with his own blood.

 

She’ll never forget the confusion in his eyes.

 

But most of all, she won’t forget Radar’s scream and how she has to forget about Hawkeye for the time being. She claps a hand over Radar’s mouth and moves him into pre-op.

 

It’s quiet for another few minutes. Radar cries, and she feels her own throat tighten with tears. He was their best surgeon. He cared so deeply for everyone at the 4077th. He was unmilitary and flirtatious, but at the end of the day, he was still a good man.

 

He died for her and Radar.

 

Every time she blinks, she sees the unnatural jerk of his body that hammered the nail in his coffin.

 

Finally, they hear a collective chorus of shouts and one final gunshot. Margaret doesn’t know what to do, but Radar’s already standing, so she follows his lead. She opens the doors to post-op (she doesn’t know how she can ever set foot in the cursed OR again), and on the other side, the doors fly open and BJ and Colonel Potter rush inside.

 

BJ is shaking like a leaf, and fire spits from his eyes. “Tell me it’s not true.”

 

Potter puts a hand on BJ’s arm. “Son, I-”

 

BJ steps forward, and now Margaret can see the tears shining in his eyes, almost covering the anger behind them. “Tell me it’s not true.”

 

She swallows and shakes her head. “The second bullet went through his heart. If he had a chance, it was gone the second time he was shot.”

 

BJ’s breathing is labored, and Margaret steps forward to hug him. He holds her tight, and his shoulders heave with his sobs. “This damn fucking war,” he grits out.

 

The doors open again, and this time, Frank comes through. Margaret half-expected him to be somewhat gleeful about Pierce’s death, but he leans heavily against the wall. “I thought he was invincible,” he says.

 

BJ pulls away from Margaret and for the first time, he notices Radar. Radar stands straight, trying to seem brave, but fat tears run hot and fast down his face. His lip trembles, and finally, he lets out a sob. BJ gently steps closer to him and pulls Radar close to him.

 

It’s no good speaking anything about Hawkeye. There’s too much pain in post-op that day. Father Mulcahy prays over Hawkeye’s body.

 

Margaret sits outside with BJ all that night, and they drink.

 

*

 

_Dear Dr. Daniel Pierce,_

_It is with deep sadness that I must inform you of the death of your son, Hawkeye Pierce. You can be real proud of Hawkeye. He was a mighty good surgeon and one of the best young men to come through Korea. The day before his death, we received word of a bug-out, but Hawkeye was in the middle of spinal surgery on a young kid. He elected to stay with the patient for the next 24-hours, along with my chief nurse, Major Margaret Houlihan, and my company clerk, Corporal Walter O’Reilly._

_Hawkeye died while protecting Major Houlihan and Corporal O’Reilly from a Chinese soldier who had been left behind. He was a good man, Dr. Pierce. He often talked about you and how much he missed you. I know he loved you very much. He was well-loved by all in the camp and no one will forget him. We will miss Hawkeye very, very much – not just because he was a talented surgeon, but because he was a good friend to every member in the camp._

_P.S.: Your son was one of the bravest men I ever knew, Dr. Pierce._

 

Radar finishes the letter to Hawkeye’s dad (he can’t ever think of him as _Dr. Pierce_ – that’s Hawkeye’s name), but before he takes it to get Colonel Potter’s approval, he stares at the first line.

 

There are days that he regrets enlisting, and then there are days where he wishes he’d never heard the name Korea.

 

If the war hadn’t existed, he would never have met Hawkeye. Hawkeye would never have been shot. He would have been a good doctor somewhere in America. Radar wouldn’t have the weight of Hawkeye’s death on his shoulders.

 

Colonel Potter had shot the Chinese soldier dead. BJ was the first to see Hawkeye’s body.

 

But he had witnessed it.

 

He’s seen a lot here in the Army. He’s seen doctors warm their hands over a patient’s wound during the winter. He’s seen a doctor do an open heart massage to keep a patient alive. He’s seen young Korean kids take shellfire from American and Communist bombs. He’s seen a man who had suffered so much from his duty in the war that his brain decided he was Jesus Christ.

 

He’s seen death and destruction almost every day, but this is the worst of it.

 

Hawkeye may have claimed to be a coward on almost every occasion he could, but really, he was the bravest man Radar had ever known.

 

*

 

In World War I, Sherman Potter’s best friend was a young kid named Benjamin Franklin Rockwell. That Ben had jet-black hair and piercing blue eyes that seemed to gaze into a person’s soul. He laughed loudly and often, and he was usually the man who brought a smile to others’ faces. He was a skilled rider and a wonderful soldier, and he never killed a single man.

 

He also died in the war.

 

Once Radar leaves Sherman’s office with the letter to Hawkeye’s father – now stamped with Sherman’s signature –, he stares into his glass of whiskey as if he’s looking in a mirror.

 

One of these days, he’s going to demand a goddamn award because he hasn’t cried in front of a single man since Ben Rockwell died.

 

In all honesty, Sherman didn’t know if he’d be able to handle Hawkeye Pierce when he first arrived. Hawkeye reminded him too much of Ben, had the same dancing eyes and the same antics, but Hawkeye was no soldier. Hawkeye was first and foremost a doctor.

 

He’s nothing now, Sherman reminds himself. Hawkeye is just a cold body with nothing left to give.

 

He drains the glass of whiskey and pours himself another double, and he drinks some more. He drinks until he forgets Hawkeye, but he remembers Ben Rockwell like the day they met.

 

And he remembers seeing both bodies at the end of the day, remembers coming back a little too late on chestnut horse, and remembers the shock in two brothers’ faces.

 

“May God damn this war,” he says, and he drinks.

 

*

 

The mail comes to his house at ten o’clock in the morning, every morning. Once a week, he receives a letter from his son, complaining about something or other in this war – sorry, _police action_ – that he’s been thrust into.

 

He walks out to his mailbox in the morning, and he flips through his mail as he walks back up the driveway. He sees that there’s a letter from the 4077th, and for a heart-stopping moment, he thinks the worst.

 

But that can’t be it. The Army already made that mistake a few months ago.

 

Daniel pours himself a cup of coffee and checks his other mail first. He got a letter from a friend of his in Tennessee – Dr. Withenmyer talks about how _his_ son got sent up to fight in Korea, and when he got wounded, Hawkeye was the doctor who operated on him. Withenmyer thanks Daniel for Hawkeye, saying that “even you aren’t as good a surgeon as your son, Dan. I can’t even find the scar on my son’s chest.”

 

Daniel grins to himself and takes out the letter from the 4077th, and the heart-stopping moment returns.

 

That isn’t Hawkeye’s handwriting. It’s not BJ’s, but he vaguely recognizes it as Radar’s handwriting, so he wonders if Radar’s just sending back the money he won from Hawkeye in a poker game (the kid always feels bad about using Hawkeye’s money to buy anything. He’ll use BJ’s, Margaret’s, even his commanding officer’s money, but he will not use Hawkeye’s).

 

When Daniel slits open the envelope, the first thing he notices is that there’s no money in the envelope. The heart-stopping moment continues, and Daniel briefly registers that his breathing is much faster and much more shallow than it should be.

 

He tears the letter out of the envelope, and he knows what’s written in it, and he knows that this time, it’s no joke. There wasn’t a mess-up this time. He blinks away his tears, but he’s still hoping that he’s wrong, still hopes that Radar was just talking about how Hawkeye stitched him up after a Jeep accident, or how Hawkeye delivered his guinea pig’s babies, but Daniel has the sinking, sinking feeling that Hawkeye will never be doing anything of the sort again.

 

_Dear Dr. Daniel Pierce,_

_It is with deep sadness that I must inform you of the death of your son–_

 

He stops reading. He has to.

 

The sob bubbles up from his chest, and he grits his teeth against the overwhelming pain. The tears burst through the dam he’s built up, and he rubs his eyes with his free hand, the letter still clutched in his hand.

 

**Dead.**

 

( _When will they stop?_ )

 

**Dead.**

 

( _Will the war ever end?_ )

 

**Dead.**

 

( _How many more deaths, how many more apologies?_ )

 

Daniel Pierce has lost a lot in his life. His only daughter died from leukemia at the age of six. His wife died two years later from pneumonia. And now, now the only family member he has left has been ripped away from him because of this Goddamn war.

 

He got a box with the letter informing him of his son’s death. When he has the energy, Daniel walks back out, picks up the box, and retreats to the living room, where he sits on his couch and slowly, painstakingly, pulls out item after item. The company chaplain attached a note, saying that Hawkeye had not had time to rewrite his will, so everything went back to Daniel Pierce.

 

The first thing he pulls out is Hawkeye’s purple robe. It’s worn at the elbows, torn at the seams, dirty with blood and mud, but it still smells like Hawkeye’s room. Dirty socks, old books, and lots of dust.

 

As he rifles through all of Hawkeye’s belongings, he manages to keep the pain at bay. It’s almost as if he can close his eyes and pretend that Hawkeye just sent his stuff in ahead of him.

 

At the very bottom of the box is his own copy of _The Last of the Mohicans._ It’s always been his favorite book, and the character Hawkeye reminded him so much of his brilliant young son that Daniel stopped calling him “Ben” and instead started calling him “Hawkeye.”

 

It’s only once he sees the book that he realizes that it’s all over. His only connection to the war has ended.

 

The Army apologies, pushes a cold metal heart into his palm. They fold a flag and present it to him, and they say they’re sorry again.

 

Hawkeye Pierce never mattered to the top guns back here. He saved their children, fought their bloody war, even died in action. To them, though, he’s just another statistic, another folded flag, another apology.

 

And when the war ends two years later, Daniel Pierce runs the numbers.

 

Thirty-seven thousand is too many, he decides.

 

To him and to Hawkeye, one death was too many.


End file.
